1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a monitoring system and a monitoring apparatus for causing a monitoring camera to capture and record a video image of an image forming apparatus in order to determine whether a material output from the image forming apparatus has been removed by a person who instructed performance of an output operation for the output material or by a person who did not instruct performance of the output operation, and to control methods for the monitoring system and the monitoring apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
An image forming apparatus that is used as a multifunction machine provided with a printing function for receiving print jobs from a personal computer (PC) and performing printing, a copy function, and the like is available. Such an image forming apparatus is connected to a network and can be shared, as a common printer, among a plurality of users. Since the image forming apparatus can be used by a plurality of users both when used as a printer and when used as a copying machine, an administrator may monitor the use status of the image forming apparatus.
A system for, when a copying machine connected to a monitoring camera determines, using pattern matching, that a document is a particular copy-inhibited document, inhibiting copying of the document and starting video image capturing using the monitoring camera is described in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No 7-44777.
For an image forming apparatus that can be used by a plurality of users, a material output from the image forming apparatus may be removed by a person who is different from a user who instructed performance of an output operation for a corresponding print job or copy job. In particular, it is undesirable that such a problem occurs when an output material contains confidential information or private information.